Friday, August 16, 2013

Mobile Gaming: Notifications Are A Part Of The Experience

Interesting post here from Touch Arcade about gaming notifications. In general, the average mobile warrior doesn't play enough games to warrant any kind of annoyance due to the gaming constantly asking you to play or update or help banish a group of bandits or whatever.

In iOS, I do get game challenges from users which is as annoying as I find it and I don't find it all that annoying at all. In fact, I like that the mobile gaming experience is engaging. Mobile gaming provides a new dimension to the experience that did not exist on the console or handhelds like the Gamboys or even today's systems.

I play lots of chess and other turn-based games with friends and even strangers. Chess with Friends? You know that game. And if you don't, you absolutely know Words with Friends. And before that, Draw Something was very popular until it quickly fizzled out.

All these games brought an online and social experience that was not really there before. And that experience comes with the system telling you when it's your turn. And you make your move whenever you want and wherever you want. I've played online games in the past and it forces you to just sit there. Not so today.

The post from TA honed in specifically on unwanted types of alerts. There are those on iOS games and I haven't played enough Android games to experience that. Developers should be keen on the types of notifications that will help players stay engaged but not to the point that it leaves them when a bad taste and ruin the experience.

Even then, that's also a fine line to that as well. I think we should let the market decide. If anything, I like more social engagements than less if it makes games more enjoyable. And I'm not talking about simple alerts or connecting merely through social networks.